2018 Tacoma 60k miles. blown cylinder and cracked head

I can take a video if you would like. My tranny is buttery smooth at lower rpms. I have a full Otto cycle tune and it has plenty of power below 3k. I have about 500 pounds of extra weight as well and I’m on 33x10 tires. I can’t even imagine hitting 5k rpms daily haha.

Last weekend i went on a 500 mile trip and I’ve seen 5k rpms a few times. Driving through mountain passes, fighting strong headwind while at max payload maintaining 80-90

 

What’s the Otto cycle tune? Does that do something with the intake cam to eliminate the Atkinson air dump? If so, what is the compression ratio ?

 

Must be a big difference between your tune and mine. If I am headed uphill at all, 2nd gear is plain gutless until like at least 20+. 2nd doesn’t feel fast until I’m at around 4000rpm and that power boost similar to the stock tune kicks in. I can drive the truck “fast” but it definitely requires winding the gears way out.

 

Can’t get that here. I am up and down the connector from West Kelowna to Pennask Summit on the Coquihalla highway, and 20 trips per summer like that with a full load, but not over load. That is a grim climb.

That stretch on the Coq highway of course littered with burned up vehicles that set of fire including 18 wheelers. I see them every trip in summer months. Cars, vans, pickups, muscle cars, 18 wheelers. Gets them all.

Up that long stretch, it runs steady 3200rpm at 110kmh (70mph), and at several points it hits 5000rpm at 90kmh (60mph), screaming like a badger. To get it below 5,000rpm on those spots I have to slow to 70kmh (45mph).

Don’t even try to use cruise up that hill, as cruise will force it to go 4500-5500rpm for half of the climb. Brutal electronic control. Take it out of cruise, and you are doing 3500rpm on the same stretch at the same mph. So, forget cruise with 3rd gen on very steep long climbs, as it is not suited for this kind of real world driving.

Cruise best suited to those long flat sleepy stretches, which there are few around here.

I never drive up the Coq highway after 7am, have to hit it before it gets too hot in the day. I won’t go up that stretch of mountain highway if the outside temperature is over 22c (72F), so that means leaving very early.

My old 1986 F150 (straight 6, 300 cyl 4spd manual) never cared one bit about that hill. It would run 5,000rpm at 45mph all the way up, screamimg like mad. Ran like new after 13 years and 175K miles, never leaked oil and never needed an oil top up between 3,000mile changes.

I change the oil in my Taco every 3,000 miles and not changing that to their recommendation. Oil is cheap.

I am at 65K miles, and I have changed my plugs and coolant both and put a new air filter in every year. All oils and lubricants front to back changed ahead of the spec schedule. If you drive the flats all the time and never push it then the spec schedule is probably ok.

For my type of driving, not going to skimp on low cost maintenance. Too risky. I have done this for 50 years now and seems to work pretty well, never a single major issue in any vehicle. However, these 3rd gen Tacos seem a little fragile to what I have driven in the past, so every maintenance will be done far ahead of recommended schedules.

 

I drove to Vernon from surrey the other weekend and I’ve seen 5k+ rpms. I’m at max payload, with RTT in the back and fighting strong headwinds while maintaining 130-140 uphills.

But city driving I don’t usually see more than 3k. 4.30 gearing helps as well.

 

Our trucks come stock with Atkinson cycle engine. My tune eliminates it and the engine runs regular Otto cycle. You can definitely feel added power down low. The best thing is, gas mileage is same. Thanks Mr OV tune!

 

Which tune are you running?

 

OTT.

 

I am at max payload as well, plus a 10 foot aluminum boat on the roof which catches a lot of wind. Every day is different. Some days it is zero wind, other days 70kmh wind. I live in Kelowna, so I am doing this basically one or more times per week from May to October, plus driving it in winter but not as often. Fishing lakes up top, and I am retired.

The temperature and humidity and elevation changes on Highway 97C make a big difference on how fast you go up that stretch. Some days I can do 130kmh with no problem. Other times 115kmh is tops and 5000 rpm at several stretches. Strange how different that can be from day to day even with the same load in the truck.

The stretch from the Great Bear snow shed to the old toll booth is very steep, but only 5 miles long. The drive on Hwy 97C from West Kelowna to Pennask summit is about 25 miles. A great engine beater. On a recent trip down, I saw a new Mercedes sedan that made it about halfway and pulled over and burned up with fire crews on the scene. I guess even those fancy cars if pushed too hard in the heat of the day can be affected. Probably poorly maintained. Crazy how many vehicles break down on that hill in summer, and many burn up.

Also in the last month I have seen the last runaway lane before West Kelowna used twice by semi-trailers pulling double loads.

Both made it about a third of the way up the runaway lane, and then ended up sideways across the dirt lane with the drives cab in the bush and the load in the bush at the opposite side.

In both cases the trucks were totally mangled. That has to be a hair raising ride to lose your brakes and fly up those steep rough dirt/gravel runaway lanes. I wonder why they don't pave them? Maybe on purpose as the rougher surface might help to slow the vehicle?

 

The run away lanes I've seen all have really deep pea gravel which really sucks the momentum out of the truck.

 

Thanks, I was just curious. Eliminating the Atkinson should turn it into more of a “stroker” and provide a lot more torque, at least with a mental picture of what’s going on.

 

Naoyuki Sakamoto is the chief engineer for the Corolla, nothing to worry about

 

It should as long as the computer can take advantage of the additional compression with optimal MBT timing.

 

Phew... I also take my truck up to high RPMs, as long as it's warm, because my belief is that there is a redline for a reason.

This truck makes most of its power at higher RPMs, so I wind out my truck like I did with my S2000, which is still running strong with more than 165k miles including track abuse.

I guess I'll continue not being afraid winding my truck out whenever I want the power.

 

Crazy! I don’t travel those mountain passes as often as you. I would say 5-6 times a year. Haven’t seen any cars overheating just yet. And yes I would think it’s not paved so it slows the truck down.

Ive got a lift, 33”tires, sliders, front bumper, winch, bed rack and RTT so It definitely doesn’t help. The headwind could be a real killer. Truck has a lot of power at 5k rpms but I don’t think it’s a great idea to keep it in that RPM range often, but there was no other way to maintain 130-140 going uphills. Surprisingly I averaged about 15.5L on that 800km trip. I do have full Otto cycle tune and I use chevron 94, it really is great! Are you on stock tune?



Kalamalka lake!

 

Chevron 94 octane?

Best we get is 91

 

And it’s E0!

 

A carbureted engine's dream!

 

Niiiiice, how much per liter?